Town of Lockport takes proactive look towards future traffic patterns

Monday October 8, 2012 | By:Rikki Cason | News

Traffic patterns and potential growth was studied by the Town of Lockport, taking a proactive step towards preventing future problems.

Supervisor Marc Smith said recently there have been several meetings between the town and the Greater Buffalo Niagara Regional Transit Committee, Niagara County, state Department of Transportation and the City of Lockport.

Smith said they took a look at all of the traffic count data from the DOT for the last 10 to 12 years. An engineer also took a look at where all further development in the town is thought to be.

Surprisingly, Smith said, there were very few roads in the town that would be close to exceeding capacity in the future.

The southeast corridor study did result in four different priorities the town will work on in the future.

Those priorities include doing something better with traffic signals, such as potentially synchronizing the traffic lights from Millersport to the City of Lockport.

After meeting with the DOT, the town learned any lights closer than 1 ˝ miles from one another could be synchronized. That would mean the town could look at synchronizing the lights at Millersport and Tonawanda Creek Road, the lights at Fisk and Rapids and the lights at Shimmer and Home Depot.

Another priority is the intersection of Transit and Robinson. Smith said the road is reaching capacity in terms of people wishing to make a left turn. One option would be to add a second left turn lane on the road.

The third priority is the section of Robinson Road from Transit to Beattie. Smith said that is the only section of road in the town that may exceed capacity in the next 15 to 20 years.

According to the most recent DOT data, at its peak, Robinson Road reaches 17,000 vehicles a day. The maximum daily average is 18,000 to 19,000.

The town is asking to partner with the DOT to find possible solutions for configurations of this road.

The final priority is a need for traffic “calming” on Transit Road from Robinson to the city.

Smith said by streetscaping, they could make the road safer for cars and pedestrians.

Possible ways to calm the roadway would be to add in medians, including a 600-foot section starting at Robinson going north.

“We ended up with a really great plan,” said Smith. “We all have a better understanding.”